Trapped

My wife just had shoulder surgery because of torn ligaments and rotator cuff problems. This means that she is medicated every six hours to help ease the pain from the procedure. It was an arthroscopic surgery, which means there are four tiny slits on her left shoulder where the surgeon entered her skin and used little instruments to either cut, trim, reattached or sew together whatever he could to repair the new damage and alleviate the old non-repairable stuff.

She is now home in her new recliner, with an electric motor, under several ice packs, trying to tolerate the pain associated with having a brace and sling attached to her torso.

An interjection here: I was going to comment on her reaction to and frustration with the discomfort. There have been tears and yelling and sobbing. Adjustments to the harness, adjustments to the pillows and padding, changing out the icepacks. Get that pill, no that one, can I have my pain pill early, okay, then when?

But then I recalled the incident of a knee flare-up on my part. Might have been gout, maybe not. The doctor wasn't totally convinced either way. But I made a fuss every time I had to sit down or stand up or get in my truck. It freakin' hurt! So I guess I am meaning to say we are all wusses when it comes to pain tolerance.

But she is still a drama queen.

Now, because she is limited in activity and ability to do certain things, like get out of her aforementioned power chair, or adjust whatever needs adjusting with her left arm and hand, I am here with her to help. This also involves food preparation, clean up, medication dispersal, laundry, grandson care, letting dogs in and out, washing her legs and feet for her comfort, watching the chick flicks she is addicted to (not all, but several), deflecting phone calls from both concerned parties and telemarketers, rubbing where it hurts and "other duties as assigned".

I am sort of trapped. I can go places, but only within a short distance and for a limited time. This time on the computer is while she is sleeping.

By the way, I tried to get this time off as Family Medical Leave Act (FMLA) unpaid leave. he requirements were that you have over one year with the company and have worked at least 1250 hours in the past 12 rolling months. I have 1226 hours of paid time. I was gone almost all of December, with the lady who is now medicated n the living room, on a trip to Europe that a lot of people could only wish they could take. I may have written half a blog earlier about that. Part 2 never got published. SO. I am 24 hours of paid time short of the requirement. I have now put in that I am taking all my accrued personal time as well as my remaining vacation time. To be honest, I really had no other plans for that vacation time, other than being here when my son and his wife came to visit around Thanksgiving time. But still, after almost 26 years with the company.......

We saw the doctor yesterday and he showed us photos of what he did. I am amazed, given that his hands are almost as big as mine, that he could perform such micro surgery with such wonderful accuracy. The next step in all of this would be "Waldoes" much like the Robert Heinlein story in the book Waldo & Magic, Inc. Interesting reading, seeing as how it was imagined over 50 years ago. You need to look it up, and maybe even read the book.

Of course, no one ever reads this stupid blog anyway, so nevermind.

Oops, the wounded wife has awakened, I must go.